A New AVA ?

Marguerite Barrett
Contributing Writer

I opened the paper recently to find a brief article tucked away on an inside page, “Midwest Vintners Press For Own Label.”  The article, written by Michael Doyle of McClatchy.com/Tribune News, discussed the efforts by a group of Upper Midwest winemakers to get an AVA designation for the Upper Mississippi River Valley.

If awarded, the AVA would be the largest in the US, covering 29,000 square miles (the Ohio River Valley AVA, currently the largest, is only 26,000 square miles) across four states: Minnesota, Iowa, Wisconsin and Illinois.  The effort to designate the region as a viticultural area began about 5 years ago in Iowa when a group of winemakers got together to launch the fairly long and involved process to be awarded an AVA designation.  A workshop was held at Iowa State University in 2005 to walk participants through the process of submitting a proposal to the United States Treasury’s Alcohol and Tobacco Tax & Trade Bureau (TTB).   Once the proposal is submitted, it can take up to two years to make its way through the government’s review process before being submitted for public comments.   Once posted, the item remains open for comments for two months and then it goes back to the Treasury for final resolution.   The Treasury department posted the Upper Mississippi River Valley proposal on August 12, 2008, one comment was received, and as of this writing, the petitioners are still awaiting the final ruling.

In addition to the Upper Mississippi River Valley, four AVA proposals have been posted for public comments since January 1, 2008 (3 of which have since been approved and established).   Other than the Upper Mississippi River Valley AVA, the proposed Happy Canyon of Santa Barbara AVA in Santa Barbara County, California is still awaiting final ruling.  If granted, this AVA would encompass  23,941 acres (37.4 square miles) with 492 acres under cultivation and 6 wineries.  The proposed area lies within the Santa Ynez Valley AVA, which in turn falls within the multi-county Central Coast AVA.

Since January 2008, the United States’ Treasury Department has officially designated six new AVAs:

• Lehigh Valley Viticultural Area established April 10, 2008.  1,888 square miles in southeastern Pennsylvania in portions of Lehigh, Northampton, Berks, Schuylkill, Carbon, and Monroe counties.
• Swan Creek Viticultural Area established May 27, 2008.  170 square miles in Wilkes, Yadkin and Iredell counties in North Carolina.  A portion of this AVA falls within the larger Yadkin Valley AVA.
• Leona Valley Viticultural Area established November 28, 2008.  8,500 acres in Northeastern Los Angeles County, roughly 45 minutes from Hollywood and downtown Los Angeles.
• Snipes Mountain Viticultural Area established February 20, 2009.  4,145 acres along the slopes of Snipes Mountain, this AVA lies entirely within the larger Yakima Valley AVA, which in turn falls within the Columbia Valley AVA.
• Haw River Valley Viticultural Area established April 29, 2009.  550,000 acres in Alamance, Caswell, Chatham, Guilford, Orange and Rockingham Counties, North Carolina.  The area lies between the cities of Greensboro and Chapel Hill and the boundaries follow those of the Haws River watershed.
• Lake Chelan Viticultural Area established May 29, 2009.  The United States’ newest AVA, and Washington State’s 11th AVA, the Lake Chelan AVA encompasses 24,000 acres along the lake’s southern and eastern shores.  The AVA falls within the larger Columbia Valley AVA and lies to the east of the Puget Sound AVA.

We’d love to hear more about these new AVAs – as well as any proposals that are currently under review; we’re also interested in learning more about the process of establishing an AVA.  Vino Verve also welcome guest columnists, individuals who, in keeping with our mission of spotlighting local wines and winemakers, are interested in writing the occasional post about your local wine region.  So, if you have any comments or thoughts you’d like to share, or are interested in being a guest columnist, let us know ~ either through the comments section on this page, or by emailing me directly at  marguerite@vinoverve.com.

This entry was posted on June 25, 2009 at 12:01 am and is filed under Marguerite Barrett, Stephen T Colbert Memorial Better Know an AVA. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed.